Wiring Harnesses

Today we were able to remove all of the rear harness and pull it through into the interior.






Removing all the seats, console and more panels made getting the wiring out possible. Oh and got that door out of the way too:

Scott, holding the massive rear harness. Who knew so much wiring was involved back there..

Now we need to just get the entire dash harness out. Everythings disconnected, its just trying to carefully pull it all out. Then, it'll be onto the engine and front harnesses and the drivetrain. The actual drivetrain should probably only take 2 days, getting all these wires out is just time consuming.. More, soon to come

The Cobra Arrives!

Finally, after much anticipation the kit arrives! Martin, from the Transport company was running a bit late but how could we be mad...


There were 5 other kits inside including a daytona coupe..


After the crane had some trouble, it finally lifted the car and chassis out..




18 boxes held everything else in the shipment. We have almost everything, but Fedex will be dropping off a few more packages Im told.






And finally at rest next to its organ donor...




What impressed me was the quality of the body. I thought the fiberglass would be pretty rough, but other than the seams and typical prep, I don't think the body guy will have much extra work involved.

Now we really need to move on the donor and get this thing together! Sunday or Monday hopefully I'll get some big steps out of the way. Stay tuned..

Interior disassembly

Today I thought I'd take care of some of the interior work. Because we need the dash harness the dash needs to be removed. First I pulled the ECU..








Then to the dash..



Now all the wires are exposed and can be pulled/pushed out. I labeled the necessary wires and harnesses with a label maker.

Donor Car: 2004 Ford Mustang Mach 1

The donor car arrives! A slightly crashed 2004 Mustang Mach 1. Ford didn't just throw some graphics on the GT for this model. The DOHC high output aluminum V8, 5 speed manual, high 3.55 geared rear end, and big brakes make it an outstanding car and the perfect Cobra donor car. Motor Trend recorded a 0-60 mph time of 4.7 seconds and 1/4 mile time of 13.2 in 2004 for the Mach 1! The Cobra will weigh roughly 1/2 ton less, so it's performance will certainly be breathtaking.

Factory Photo:

The Donor:

The damage from its, uh, fender bender, luckily didn't touch the motor/trans/axle and most of the other needed parts so no worries.

First thing to be done is to make sure our drivetrain is in good working order. After a crash, Ford uses an inertia switch to disarm the fuel pump. We simply flip the switch to get the pump back on:

It's a tight fit but there is space between the pulleys and car, so the engine didn't make contact with anything in the crash.


We clear some things out of the way.



The battery is in about the same condition of the front fenders, so we remove it to use a working unit.



Next we removed the miscellaneous things and shaker assembly.


At this point we put the intake tube and maf back on to start the car. It ran perfectly, no check engine codes, oil pressure was excellent, ran nice and smooth. Now we know, its good to go and can start the removal process.. The next step is to drain fluids, label the wires and then pull the drivetrain and necessary parts.